1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a device that holds a drink vessel which can rest on a plate or other surface allowing the user to maintain the drink vessel securely thereon with one hand freeing the other hand. The present invention works specifically with a drink vessel that has a generally concave bottom, such as beverage can as well as certain glass and stem ware.
2. Background of the Prior Art
Most parties and other similar social occasions serve both food and drink. Obviously, the food is placed onto a plate while the drink is held within a drink vessel such as a can, or a glass, either a drink glass or a wine glass. This very straightforward holding method, while very efficient in its containment performance, does have its drawbacks.
If the social occasion is such that food and drink are retrieved from one or more central serving stations, and upon retrieval of the bounty, the user returns to a seat at a table, the separate plate and drink vessel tend to be satisfactory for most such occasions—also efficient for being served. The problem arises when it is desired that the party attendee not return to a table for consumption of the food and drink being served. Such lack of a desired destination can occur when the party host lacks sufficient sit down facilities to accommodate all of the guests. This typically occurs when it is the host's desire to keep the attendees on their feet in order to keep the attendees circulating in order to facilitate dynamic guest interaction.
As the guest must hold the food filled plate with one hand and the drink vessel with the other, this desire to keep a large portion of the guests circulating at any given time, presents some problems. Although sipping a drink presents few problems, having both hands full makes the consumption of the food on the plate a tricky occurrence. The guest may sit at a table to consume both food and drink in relative comfort. However, either by necessity or by design, the availability of sitting locations may be at a premium and many guests do not want to sit down desiring to mingle even while eating and drinking. The guest may find a location, such as a table, onto which either the plate or the drink vessel may be placed, thereby freeing one hand allowing for proper maneuverability between plate and drink vessel. However, this may also be problematic due to the limited availability, either by necessity or by design, of such rest areas available to the guest. Furthermore, this method also tends to tie down the guest to a specific location, although not necessarily as much as sitting at a table.
Another method used to overcome the problem of having both hands full, is for the guest to retrieve their food or drink initially, and upon consumption of the initial item, to retrieve the other item in order to consume food and drink in sequential fashion. While this method works as planned, most guests desire to have a drink during, as opposed to before or after, food consumption. Additionally, this arrangement throws into disarray parties that are designed for the intermingling of food and drink such as wine and cheese parties or beer and pretzel parties.
One other method employed by many guests is to attempt to hold the food plate and the drink vessel with one hand and to use the other hand to facilitate enjoyment of the consumables. While many guests may prove to be quite adept at succeeding with such maneuverability, other guests will proceed with disastrous and embarrassing results.
In order to facilitate the ability of a guest to be able to enjoy food and drink simultaneously without the need to sit at a table or to place either the food bearing plate or the drink vessel onto a fixed surface and without the need to perform heroic acrobatics, combined plate and drink vessel holders have been proposed. Such prior art devices are designed to serve as a plate in order to hold food and are also designed to hold a drink vessel securely so that a user can hold the food bearing plate and drink vessel with one hand in order to allow the other hand to be available to facilitate the enjoyment of the food and drink. Such prior art devices come in a variety of designs and work with varying degrees of efficiency, however, they tend to suffer from one or more drawbacks.
Many such food plate and drink vessel holding devices perform their intended task with great efficiency, yet such devices are unduly complex in design and construction, making such devices unusually expensive to employ. As these devices tend to be disposable, a high cost device is unjustified in most settings. Other prior art devices have the ability to hold only a specific type or specific size of drink vessel, making the utility of such devices limited in many situations. Still other devices require certain steps to be taken for proper device usage, which steps may not be obvious to a guest who has not encountered such a device previously, rendering such devices awkward in operation with the potential for device failure and the attendant embarrassment that results.
My previous U.S. Pat. No. 6,609,625, issued on Aug. 28, 2003, has resolved many prior art problems while my continued work in this field has produced an ever expanding set of device solutions to the need to be able to hold a plate and a drink vessel with a single hand in order to allow the use of the other hand for consumption efforts from the plate and vessel.